Deep inside, in the space below my rib cage and above my stomach, a rage started to burn. I wanted to meet this Regina Matheson. To crouch down, gaze into her face and order her not to fill Tegan's head with such terrors. Things were bad enough without her telling Tegan that she didn't belong with anyone.

"And she said I don't have a real family because I don't have a daddy."

The rage exploded into flames. This girl was unbelievable. What other half-truths had she filled Tegan's head with?

"Well, you know what, I bet Regina Matheson doesn't know if her mummy wants her all the time," I said. I'd heard this somewhere and was going to bastardize it for my own purposes.

Tegan's eyes widened in wonder.

"Her mummy is stuck with her. No matter what she does, her parents have to keep her, but I chose to have you with me. And I don't have to keep you but I want to. I want to keep you all the time and no matter what happens I'll always want to keep you with me. Do you understand?"

Tegan nodded.

"Don't get me wrong, I'm sure Regina's mother loves her very much, but she didn't choose her. She got what she was given, while I picked you."

"Are you glad you picked me?" she asked in a quiet voice.

"I'm not only glad, I'm ECSTATIC!" I screeched and fell on Tegan, tickling her. Her little body bucked under my tickles and the lovely sound of her laughter filled the bedroom. "Oh dear, I think Tiga needs more tickling!" I dived for her again. She kicked her legs and shook her head, laughing with all her body.

I sat back and let her breathe. She giggled some more while I smoothed the covers back over her body.

"My mummy tickled me," Tegan said.

"I know," I said, trying to smile. My throat constricted suddenly and my eyes began to sting, like they did whenever I thought of Adele.

"What does heaven look like?" Tegan asked, her eyes heavier and her voice sleepier than they had been a minute ago.

I slowly shook my head. "I don't know," I replied.

"Does it look like that?" She pointed at the picture on the chimney breast opposite her bed. We'd painted it so many eons ago I'd literally stopped looking at it, but now I saw it with fresh eyes. The emerald fields, the green-topped brown trees, the big yellow sun, the white clouds on blue sky, and the red and white swirly sweets for flowers. It was a good picture, even if I did paint it. It'd be lovely if heaven was like that, but I'd never given heaven much thought. Not even after Adele's death. I knew how I felt about religion-that for the most part I believed there was a God, a higher power-but I always thought that heaven was maybe clouds. No, I didn't think that. I didn't know what I thought because I never thought about it. The picture was as good a scene of heaven as any, I suppose.

"Maybe, sweetheart. But I don't know."

"My mummy would like it if it was."

"Yes, she would, but I think she'd like a few clothes shops too."

Tegan's face scrunched up as she nodded and laughed.

"Right, madam, are you going to sleep? It's way, way past your bedtime."

"OK," she said sleepily.

I leaned forward, pressed my lips against her cool forehead. "Goodnight, gorgeous."

"Na-night, Mummy Ryn."

I wandered into the living room and started as I found Luke sprawled on the sofa watching television. I was so surprised I couldn't help, "Oh," escaping my lips.

"Oh?" he replied cautiously.

We had an honest friendship-relationship-but no one would take kindly to being told you'd forgotten they existed. And I had. In the talk of Adele, I'd forgotten he was in the flat.

"I mean, oh, you've washed up," I covered.

"Wasn't I meant to?"

"It's not that...I'm tired."

He flicked off the television, moved his long legs off the sofa onto the floor, got up. "In other words, you want me to go." Luke stretched out his body, throwing his head back and arms out. His white T-shirt rode up, flashing his muscular stomach.

"I didn't say that," I protested halfheartedly.

"You didn't have to, your face says it all."

"Yeah, well, my face has been lying for years, so I don't know why you choose now to believe it."

Luke put his head to one side and his hazel eyes narrowed slightly. "How about you go cry in the bedroom, I wait here until you're calmer and then we start again?"

"Don't patronize me," I spat.

"Or, you could tear a few more strips off me but let's do it in the bedroom so T doesn't hear."

"Or you could f-off home."

"Or I could f-off home."

Nate used to do this. Used to ride out my moods with an incredible amount of stoicism, refusing to rise to any type of bait. Luke stuck his hands in his jeans pockets, his head still on one side as he waited for me to decide what would be the best move.

"I feel so guilty," I stated. Talking. That was the best move. Sharing with my boyfriend.

"For?"

"For everything. For not being there when Adele needed me. For not taking care of Tegan sooner. For thinking twice about taking Tegan on. For not being with Adele when she died. For being so bad a mother I forgot Tegan that time. For not being able to raise her how her mum would have done.

"And all the while there's some silly child at school telling her that I'm not her real mother and I never will be. So obviously she's going to feel abandoned because not even I'm her real family...Do you think I should complain to the school?"

"Not right this second, no," Luke said.

"If you keep patronizing me..."

"Sorry," he said. "OK, look, you shouldn't worry about her not thinking of you as her mother-she calls you Mummy."

"Because her real mum told her to."

"But she still does it. And not just to you, by the sound of it. When she calls the office she asks for Mummy Ryn, doesn't she?" I nodded. "And, for this girl at school to have said this about you not being her mum, she must be calling you Mummy Ryn when you're not there. She truly thinks of you as her second mother." I must have looked unconvinced because he added: "There is one way you can fix that."

"What, go back in time and give birth to her?"

Luke rolled his eyes. "Ryn, I know the social worker freaked you out, but I think you should focus on adopting her again. Get T counseling, get the relevant forms, do whatever it takes to make her a Matika."

I sighed internally. It was all right for him to say "do whatever it takes" because he didn't know. Even Luke, who grew up in the care system, didn't know what "whatever it takes" would entail. He didn't realize that to adopt Tegan, I would have to contact Nate.

"tell me again, please tell me again"

chapter 27.

Whose idea was it to come up to town on a Saturday?

Even when I was childless and single I avoided central Leeds on the weekend unless I had no other choice. Working in a large department store meant that didn't happen often-I had access to everything from clothes to homeware, books to computer accessories.

Today, however, we were pushing our way through the crowds of the St. John's Center, having been driven into town by his Royal Highness Luke Wiseman. He who had decreed that we should come up here for the day. "It'll be fun," he said, in hearing range of Miss Hedonist herself, Tegan Brannon, knowing that once she was on his side I wouldn't refuse.

Outside was saturated with cold. White plumes of expelled air rose up from the people huddled in coats, hands pushed deep into pockets, heads down against the wind that clawed frost across any exposed body part. In less than twenty steps I had crossed the ice-slimy brick pavement and pushed open the glass door to Angeles's biggest department-store rival up north, John Lewis. I held the door for Tegan and Luke, who were right behind me, then crossed the entrance to the next set of glass doors. Pushing that one open and stepping through, I held it for them then carried on. I was assailed again by people. The chill that had attached itself to my skin and clothes evaporated and I was instantly too hot.

I was striding toward the escalator when a woman who didn't seem to know it was winter-what with her outfit of micro-mini and big woolly sweater-bashed into my shoulder with her shoulder while, at the same time, her plastic shopping bag, which had something heavy and glass in it, connected with the bony bit of my shin. The crack rang in my ears as the pain knocked stars behind my eyes. Instead of apologizing, like most people would, she shot me a filthy look, then stalked on. "Do you wanna break the other fucking leg too?" I turned to shout at her until I caught sight of Tegan and Luke heading through the crowd, the pair of them smiling at the shoppers they passed. The insult dried up in my mind. I couldn't do that sort of thing anymore-I was a responsible, example-setting parent.

I returned to my leg and allowed myself a loud but soundless, "Ow!" as I bent to rub at my damaged shin. I may never walk again, I decided when my fingers connected with the afflicted area and pain jolted up my leg. "Bitch, I should've taken her down," I hissed, then straightened up, managing to knock into another solid human form.

Does anyone else want to fucking knock me about, or what? I screamed inside, swiveling my glare to the latest person to make my hit list. My body was jolted again, this time not in pain but in shock. My heart stopped beating and the breath caught in my chest as my eyes focused on the man in front of me.

Nate.

Like twin beacons of astonishment, my name flashed up in his eyes: Kam. He said it too; breathed the single-syllable word between his plump, pink lips: "Kam."

Weeks had passed since Luke had convinced me to refocus on adopting Tegan and I still hadn't made steps toward contacting Nate. I couldn't. Every time I thought of him, of his face at the funeral, of forming words to speak to him, my mind would blank it out and I'd retreat into denial. I couldn't do it.

Nate was exactly as I remembered him: his brown-black hair softly sculpted into short peaks away from his face. His skin still smooth. His navy blue eyes that could effortlessly unearth my deepest kept secret. His nose, straight with its small upturn at the end. His mouth, my favorite part of his face, like firm marshmallows made from a mold of Cupid's bow. My eyes swept over his face again. He hadn't changed a bit.

"It is you, isn't it?" he asked when I didn't speak. "I'm not hallucinating or anything, am I?"

I shook my head, unable to jump-start my vocal cords.

"You haven't changed a bit," he continued.

I moistened my lips, ready to attempt a reply, when Luke-Tegan sitting on his shoulders, her gloved hands holding on to the fingertips of his bare hands-appeared beside me. He looked at me, saw the imprint of shock on my face, then took in Nate's wide forehead, his big eyes, soft mouth and the full-size version of Tegan's nose, and his heartbeat almost visibly tripled. "We'll wait for you over there," my lover mumbled, then navigated the pair of them away from us before Tegan had a chance to speak.

Nate blinked at me a few times. "What are the chances?" he asked as though we hadn't been interrupted.

"Nathaniel," I finally uttered.

"Nate," he corrected, searching my eyes for a flicker of a memory. "You're the one who started calling me that, you can't go full name on me now." He smiled and my stomach turned to jelly, quivering at the bottom of my abdomen.

"Nathaniel," I repeated, using a firmer tone as I grappled for control of the situation. Before the funeral, the last time I'd seen him was the day I returned to London for my belongings and left him-the day my eyes were dry, red holes in my head and he looked like he hadn't slept in years-and in this moment there was every danger the shock of this meeting would consume me. "What are you doing here?" I asked.

"I live here," he replied.

"What? In Leeds?" I recoiled; he couldn't, he just couldn't. Having two hundred miles between us had always been a comforting factor in our breakup-there was no chance of running into him.

"Yes. No. I mean, no. I live in Tadcaster. Halfway between Leeds and York." He pointed over his shoulder, as though Tadcaster could be found in the haberdashery department. "I, erm, got a job as group scheduler at Yorkshire and Pennines FM. Erm, about a year or so now."

"OK," I said, outwardly nonchalant, internally appalled: I'd spent the past twelve months playing Russian roulette with bumping into him. That thought was nauseating.

"Obviously you still live up here," he said.

"Obviously."

Nate's expression changed, the shock whisked away and replaced by sadness. "How are you coping since...?" His voice trailed. Since...Nate, like everyone else, me included, avoided that word, skirting around it like a pothole in the road. Pretending it wasn't there, as though death wasn't as bad, as devastating, if you didn't utter the word.

I shrugged. "I'm fine, I guess. How are you?"

"Much the same." Our eyes slotted together like a key slipping into a lock, and I was free-falling, cut adrift in time. I didn't know when I was, if I was back four years ago, gazing into Nate's navy blue eyes, wondering why he loved me; why he was so good to me. Then I was falling again-further back, meeting him for our first date and seeing his eyes crinkle up as they saw me. I almost surrendered to the falling. Almost stepped forward expecting his arms to loop around me while I immersed myself in the closeness of his warm body. It'd be so easy. All I had to do was let go of the ledge of reality I was clinging to and plummet into my history like Alice tumbling down the rabbit hole. Let it happen. Feel it all again. Pull yourself together! I snapped at myself, wrenching my sensibilities back into the present.

"I did think about getting in touch," Nate said carefully.

"I didn't know how you'd react, though, if it'd just add to it all."

Enough Adele talk, I decided, lowering my head to my scuffed, tan leather boots. I raised my left foot and rubbed the tip clean on the back of the right leg of my jeans, effectively distancing myself from him. Nate couldn't understand how lacerated I felt most of the time, no one except possibly Tegan could understand. That every day that I didn't simply stop, frozen with grief, was an excellent day. Nate, simply by being there, was smearing salt-coated guilt into the wound. Talking about it would result in a breakdown.

Understanding almost straightaway that I wasn't talking about it anymore, Nate changed the subject. "Boyfriend?" he asked.

I raised my head. "Sorry?"

"That guy." He inclined his head in Luke and Tegan's direction. I followed his line of sight. A little way away, standing in front of a glass case of expensive, delicate silver jewelry, Luke was unselfconsciously dancing, bobbing from one foot to the other, holding on to Tegan's hands and bouncing her on his shoulders as he moved in time to Elvis's "Little Less Conversation" playing over the store's speakers. She giggled loudly as her hair, loose around her face and topped by her furry black hat, moved like golden waves in time with the rhythm. They were two of the happiest people in the store; even the grumpiest shoppers grinned a little when they walked past the jiggling pair. "Is he your boyfriend?"

"Yeah," I smiled, proud that he was my man because he so unreservedly loved Tegan.

"And that's his daughter?"

I tore my gaze from them to frown at Nate, searching his face for a sign that he recognized her. Nothing. A blank expression accompanied his question as he awaited my reply. I wasn't surprised he didn't recognize Adele's daughter. We had virtually lived with them, but Nate wasn't interested in children-he had a voracious appetite for adult company, loved socializing and being with people, but children, who he didn't know how to communicate with, nothing. He would watch Tegan performing one of her dances if we made him, but he'd always have one eye on the television or on the paper or staring into space. When I told him she'd said her first word, he'd managed to say, "Really?" in such a way that he almost convinced me he was interested.

"No," I replied to his question about Luke and Tegan.

"He's looking after her."

"Oh." He smiled slightly at me. "Cute kid."

I moistened my lips, ready to utter, Your kid, then realized that it wasn't the right setting: a department store on a Saturday afternoon, with hundreds of people milling around, wasn't the ideal place to discover you were a father. Very few places would be ideal but this was less perfect than most.

Should I tell him anyway? I wondered, staring up at him. What if Nate wanted in on her life? Not likely, considering his apathy toward children, but it still worried me. My instincts told me not to tell him at all, to leave him in the happy state of ignorance within which he'd existed for six years. He was her father though, and Tegan had a right to know him, to have him in her life, especially after losing her mother.